


Uprising

by TenSpencerRiedPlease



Category: X-Men: First Class (2011) - Fandom
Genre: Alternate Universe - Music, Charles Xavier has a Ph.D in Adorable, Erik Has Feelings, Erik is Crushing Harder than a 12-year Old Girl, I Don't Even Know, I don't know how to explain this, No Plot/Plotless, Random & Short, Raven is a Good Bro
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-06-20
Updated: 2016-06-20
Packaged: 2018-07-16 04:29:34
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,701
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7252117
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TenSpencerRiedPlease/pseuds/TenSpencerRiedPlease
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>He had let Raven talk him into going to an Uprising concert because Hank had backed out. Of course he had, Hank liked them less than Charles did, but he doesn’t tell Raven that because she did find genuine joy in the band’s music. </p>
<p>But then Hank disliked anything that wasn’t classical so his distaste for the band was unsurprising. “Don’t look so <em>gloomy</em> Charles, you’re at a concert <em>and</em> you didn’t have to pay,” she tells him, bumping their shoulders together.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Uprising

**Author's Note:**

> This is named after Muse's Uprising, which is personally one of my fav Erik songs (though Devil on My Shoulder by Billy Talent is also good). 
> 
> I honestly do not know, I had some writers block and this was bouncing around in my head. It helps to get the new ideas out when I can so this is what I produced. Sorry but also not really. I hope ya like it lol.

How Raven talked him into this he had no idea. _She_ might be a big fan of Uprising but Charles found the music to be too angry for his tastes though Raven would claim he didn’t like it because it was too revolutionary. That was hardly true though, he rather liked the sentiments behind Lehnsherr’s music, it was the tone he didn’t care for. As a telepath tone was everything and the anger, sadness, and hurt that coated the tone of his music made it difficult to enjoy. Charles himself preferred things that were more upbeat, or classical music because it helped him focus.

Despite that he had let Raven talk him into going to an Uprising concert because Hank had backed out. Of course he had, Hank liked them less than Charles did, but he doesn’t tell Raven that because she did find genuine joy in the band’s music. But then Hank disliked anything that wasn’t classical so his distaste for the band was unsurprising. “Don’t look so _gloomy_ Charles, you’re at a concert _and_ you didn’t have to pay,” she tells him, bumping their shoulders together.

She was in her natural blue form, most of the people here seemed to have some sort of visible mutation, and he thought that telling. He didn’t need to enter her mind or anyone else’s to know that they found power in Lehnsherr’s music, acceptance, hence Raven making no effort to hide her natural body. This was the only reason he agreed to come, because he liked communities like this. To the average person they only felt the general tone around them, but Charles felt every emotion the audience did, every swell of joy, happiness, righteous anger, sadness, bliss. He felt everything and it gave him a natural high, at least during the concert, afterwards he was exhausted and he wanted to nap. But oh, while he was there he felt emotions on a grand scale and it was so impressive, so _beautiful_ , so even though he didn’t like the music he knew he’d enjoy the concert.

“I’m at a concert that I have no genuine interest in, but thank you for the ticket,” he says, not wanting to sound ungrateful.

“Let me guess, you aren’t a mutant,” someone says behind him, sounding snide and rude. Charles wasn’t much of the reactionary type but after reading through so many articles for his thesis he was tired.

_I’m an omega-class telepath, thank you_ Charles thinks at the responsible party, using the same snide tone he had received. Raven turns to give the guy a dirty look, not realizing that Charles had already responded via telepathy.

“Why would I bring someone who wasn’t a mutant? They don’t belong here,” she says, rolling her eyes.

“Raven!” Charles says, offended at her exclusiveness. Yet another problem with Lehnsherr he had, the man was zealously pro-mutant, which normally wouldn’t bother Charles, but at the cost of humans seemed a bit excessive.

“What? The music isn’t meant for them,” she says, frowning at him. The people in the immediate vicinity chimed in mental agreements, and the guy who made the snide comment earlier throws out an ‘amen, sister!’

Charles sighs, “well, I suppose you’re not wrong,” he says, thinking over the lyrics he could remember off-hand. _If I could walk into your mind, you’d see that we’re the same, you and I._ The lyric had stuck out to Charles because it annoyed him, the implication Lehnsherr knew anything about telepathy or how it worked. They weren’t the same and he didn’t much like the implication that they were. The only people who knew anything about being a telepath were other telepaths, and even then there were so many differences and nuances to their gifts that it made it impossible to label them with any sort of sameness.

Normally he would have assumed Raven would agree, she told him all the time that he knew nothing of what it was like to have a visible mutation like hers. He was rather ashamed to admit that until very recently he hadn’t believed her, though he was learning now. It was required for his research, after all, and a good researcher examined every angle. Though when he had pointed out his irritation with the lyric, and the others that were similar, she had brushed him off. She hero-worshiped Lehnsherr and Charles found it annoying and nonsensical.

But he had come to the concert with her as a show of support and, if he was truly honest with himself because he thought that if was going to find support anywhere, well, it’d be with other mutants. People weren’t much fond of telepaths and thankfully his mutation allowed him to escape any dangerous situations but not every telepath was so lucky. Perhaps, if he was lucky, these people wouldn’t fear him the way everyone else did. He doubted it, he always felt a sharp jab of fear and suspicion whenever someone found out about his mutation but he could hope.

*

Lehnsherr’s voice is beautiful Charles thinks, or maybe that’s what the people around him are thinking. He’s not sure anymore because he’s lost in the feelings of everyone around him, riding out every personal experience everyone here has ever had with the songs Lehnsherr wrote. Images and feelings flash through his mind too fast for him to catch anything but the overall sense of emotion that the audience was feeling. _Acceptance_ , he was feeling acceptance, love, pride, _belonging_. There was more too, the despair, loneliness, the feeling of desperation and alienation from communities that weren’t this one. It was powerful and it had been a long time since Charles has ever felt anything like this, and even then it wasn’t the same.

Raven’s horrible out of tune singing wasn’t even as horribly grating as it normally was. She was clinging to him hard, swaying them along to the music as best as she could when they were pressed tightly to the fence that was in front of them with hundreds of people crowded around behind them. Erik Lehnsherr had one hell of a stage presence, Charles had to admit, because he was almost… _magnetic_. He all but forced you to look in his direction with all that passion, all that _feeling_. His own feelings were nearly as strong as his entire audience’s and Charles was heady with all the sensations and experiences around him. “Told you you’d like it!” Raven yells at him and Charles doesn’t bother to respond. It wasn’t the _concert_ he liked, it was the audience’s response that was making this enjoyable.

By his estimations Lehnsherr’s band was halfway through their set when he literally _floats_ above the crowd. Charles laughs along with the rest of the audience, stuck between his own response and the reactions of those around him. But everyone here agreed that Erik was dramatic, it was half the reason they were here. Thankfully everyone also seemed to agree that his obsession with magenta was weird, but they also seemed to agree that they were all going to wear it for symbolic purposes. Charles thought that was absurd, especially because Raven’s wardrobe has slowly been becoming more and more magenta and she hated the color.

Lehnsherr continues his songs while floating and Charles has to commend that kind of focus, being able to hold himself up via mutation while also worrying about hitting the right notes at the right time. His mutation wasn’t some sort of levitation thing either, Raven had mentioned it once, but he couldn’t remember what it was. Just that he didn’t think it had anything to do with floating or levitation abilities. He’d ask Raven later. He might have considered asking her telepathically in the moment but Lehnsherr decided that was his time to float back over the fence and deliver a dramatic speech.

God, Charles was certain this guy was one bad day from super villainy but when he addressed the crowd as ‘men, women, and every other beautiful soul’ Raven relaxed some and he couldn’t help but develop a small soft spot for the man. It was irritating for Raven, being gendered when she… wasn’t, not in the way one would typically understand gender or even sex. When you had the ability to take on every and any physical sex it made gender difficult, or so Raven explained. She felt at home in every body she took on and so she didn’t feel she really had a single gender, or even a single sex really, though she stuck with female pronouns. It was easier, she said, and she didn’t need one more reason for people to target her. Charles found the line corny but it was important to Raven to avoid a single gender when possible.

He listens, sort of, more so enjoying the feeling he was getting in his minds eye, when Lehnsherr makes his way over to where Charles and Raven were standing. Raven looks about ready to faint but Lehnsherr’s eyes skip past her to Charles, lips twitching up just a bit into a shark-like grin. “You look rather out of place, who button-downs to a concert?” he asks, snapping Charles out of his happy place.

“I like my button downs,” he says, hand pressed to his shirt in offense.

“Just be lucky I got him to leave the sweater vest in the car,” Raven yells, sensing an opportunity to embarrass him in front of hundreds of people and taking it. He was going to be having _words_ with her about this later.

Lehnsherr looks amused with Raven, “beautiful skin,” he says and Raven is so shocked by the comment she turns into Hank. That earns a laugh though he turns his attention back to Charles, “I’m curious, what d you do?” he asks. His mutation, Charles knew, was what he was asking about.

“Telepath,” he says blandly, shrugging.

“Telepath?” Lehnsherr clarifies and Charles nods, “oh, we have one of those,” he says, gesturing back to the stage. The beautiful blonde waves and Charles frowns because he hadn’t noticed here there, well, not by mind anyways. The woman was drop dead gorgeous, one would have to be blind not to notice her there, but her mind was… blocked off somehow. Well, that was peculiar, he’s never met someone whose mind he couldn’t access. “Class?” Lehnsherr asks.

“Omega,” he admits somewhat reluctantly and he waits for the general fear and suspicion to hit like it normally did when Lehnsherr clarifies into the fucking microphone that… he wasn’t holding. The thing was floating in front of him and Charles hadn’t even noticed that until now, but now that he thought about it he hadn’t been holding it the entire show. Oh. What surprises him more than that was that there wasn’t that backlash, not in the same way. There were feelings of suspicion, and a little fear, but that was hard to feel over the overwhelming sensation of _home_ and oh, he had never felt anything like _that_ before.

“That’s impressive,” Lehnsherr says, “but it must be painful for you here, with all the voices. I know Emma gets exhausted and she isn’t quite that powerful.” He looks concerned, no, he _is_ concerned and that throws Charles for a moment. More so because Erik was making an effort to _project_ that worry to him.

“Actually, I rather like gatherings like this. When people all some together with a common goal all feeling things at the same time is… cathartic. Granted when the event is over I’ll be emotionally exhausted but for now it’s so… honestly it would be easier to show you,” he says finally, not having the words to describe the experience. There wasn’t a name for this kind of euphoria, the way he felt what everyone else felt, the way he could ride out everyone else’s high.

“Then do it,” Erik says and Charles’ eyebrows shoot up in surprise, “well, come on,” he says. Charles is more than a little surprise when he lifts off the ground but he quickly gathers what Erik has done, and exactly what his mutation was. Metal manipulation and the ability to manipulate electromagnetic fields as well, amazing. Thankfully Erik seems to have good control over his power because Charles lands safely on the other side of the fence.

A glace back to Raven reveals that she’s surprisingly excited when he had expected jealousy. Well, that was a relief. Taking a shaky breath he steps forward, closer to Erik, “do you mind?” he asks, gesturing loosely to his own head.

“I already gave you permission,” Erik point out and Charles laughs harshly because that didn’t matter, people always told him to read their minds if they wanted to know what their problems were. In the same breath they would snarl at him to get out of their heads and it left him annoyed and frustrated. “Its fine, I’m not going to judge you for your mutation, no one here will,” Erik says earnestly and to his intense surprise Charles believes him. These people thought Erik was their hero, if he was fine with Charles in his head they all would be. If he wasn’t, well, it would be no trouble to freeze everyone and go before anyone made trouble.

He takes another step forward and reaches out to Erik’s mind, over taking it easily and he can feel Erik’s surprise. “You lowered you mental shields already,” Charles tells him in his own mindscape, “though I wouldn’t have had a problem removing the walls if I wanted to anyways. Not that I would, of course,” he throws in.

Erik tilts his head to the side and briefly examines Charles’ mind, Westchester, before turning back. “Do you get that a lot, fear that you’ll enter someone’s mind without their permission?” he asks.

“You know I do,” Charles says, getting flashes of the blonde woman rolling her eyes, presumably dealing with the same issues.

“They shouldn’t be afraid you know, this is a part of you, another sense. Its no less invasive that merely looking at them, and like looking you know there’s a time and place,” Erik says.

Charles laughs because he hadn’t expected something to… optimistic from someone who sang about destroying the system. “The problem is that they don’t know if I’m in their head or not, they fear that I know all their secrets already. It’s understandable,” Charles says. It isn’t like he would want anyone to know his own secrets, his own inner thoughts.

“People’s thoughts are dreadfully boring so I hear, always sex and heartbreak,” Erik tells him with a grin. Images of that blonde woman pop up again, with a name this time, Emma.

“She forgot pets,” Charles says, amused, “though who could hate images of cute kittens? I’m aware that every mind I come into contact with would never be so important to be that I’d clean it out of all information, but people assume that they _are_ that important.”

“Arrogant,” Erik says, sneering, “they use it as an excuse to fear you, ostracize you, simply because they’re too small minded to understand.” And _now_ they exactly where Charles would have expected them to be.

“Maybe. But what am I supposed to do, mind control the mutantphobia out of them?” he asks.

“Would it _really_ be that unethical?” Erik asks, smiling and Charles laughs, getting amused vibes from Erik. He supposed not, but it would still be a violation of a person’s mind so he wouldn’t ever do that. It was only fair. “The concert, though?” Erik asks and right, yes.

The scene changes and now they’re standing, well, floating in a bunch of white lights that represented everyone in the room. Erik mumbles something in German, Charles thinks, before switching languages. “This is… there no words for this,” he says finally and there are tears in his eyes as he looks around, feels what everyone else was feeling, what _Charles_ felt.

“Told you it was easier to show you,” Charles says, amused.

For a moment Erik soaks it all in before he turns to back to Charles, head tilted, “you don’t feel the same way they do,” he says.

“I’m not much of a fan, I’m afraid, but I don’t need to be to enjoy this.” It was a beautiful thing, the collective joy at a concert, or any other gathering of passionate people. He thinks that was why he had enjoyed church so much as a child while Raven hated it. Granted she had had to wear those horrible flowery dresses with the poufy sleeves so that was at least half her problem with the institution.

“And why’s that?” Erik asks, giving him that shark-like grin again.

“Not much of a separatist,” Charles admits with a laugh.

“You’re a fool,” Erik tells him.

“We can agree to disagree, then,” Charles says and Erik nods, briefly turning back to the lights.

“Can I ask you a favor?” he asks and Charles can feel the apprehension, the fear. But it wasn’t directed at Charles and that was curious.

“I suppose so,” Charles says. He can’t possibly see a way this would go wrong, really.

“Can you… show me my mind?” he asks and that’s an odd request but Charles agrees. The scenery changes again and Charles frowns at the space, no, _wasteland_ around them. The land is desolate, barren, with metal and barbed wire sticking up in various places. This place looks dangerous, scary, and Charles can feel Erik’s disappointment and something else he doesn’t quite have a name for. Whatever this was Erik was looking for something and he hadn’t found it. Charles frowns though because this was not how he had felt Erik’s mind, he was missing something and oh, he notices the small wave and if he was not familiar with mindscapes he might not have noticed that.

“This isn’t your mind,” he says to Erik. It was illusion that Erik had made from… well it appeared he was hiding his mind from _himself_. This was intensely personal and Charles feels like he’s intruding but he was already here, it wasn’t as if he could take this experience from anyone but Erik and that wouldn’t be fair.

“You aren’t intruding if I asked you here,” Erik says and Charles jumps slightly, having not heard Erik sneak up behind him.

“You know that the connection goes both ways?” he asks out of surprise. Ah yes, the telepath’s best kept secret. Telepathy like this made a two-way link, meaning that anyone connected could get just as much out of Charles or any other telepath capable of this just as vulnerable as the person they were mentally attached to. But no one was interested in hearing the vulnerabilities of the telepath because they were too busy condemning them.

“Oh course, I’m good friends with a telepath,” Erik tells him, an image of Emma appearing again. Right. “This isn’t my mind though? If it isn’t my mindscape than what is it? And why is it here?” he asks. The questions were uncomfortable but Charles would answer them.

“Because,” he says, reaching out to touch Erik’s temple, reaching into his mind, “you are hiding from yourself. You worry that your anger consumes you, that you have nothing else left to offer and so you’ve made a mindscape that represents your worst fears, one that covers what’s really there. Something your own telepath couldn’t quite reach,” he says and he steps back. Erik keeps his eyes closed for a moment, afraid that Charles hasn’t changed anything at all in his mind.

So Charles turns around to look at what was underneath Erik’s fear and anger and sucks in a sharp breath at the beauty. Metal gleams everywhere, extending into the bright sky almost like skyscrapers. The metals were all different too, some rare, other’s common, and they were all different colors. Almost like gemstones, Charles thinks, and this was one of the most beautiful minds he had ever seen. There were bits that were less pleasant, places that were rusted or damaged, but there was so much more that stood strong, resilient. Like his songs encouraged other’s to be.

Behind him Erik gasps, “how… where did you find this?” he asks, voice shaky.

“Behind your image of yourself, and behind what you think others see of you. It was a bit too deep for Emma to find, I’m afraid, though she’s gotten close.” This wasn’t the first time Erik has done this and Charles is shocked at the sheer amount of trust Erik would have to have in him to ask Charles to do this.

“You know what it’s like,” Erik tells him, “to feel isolated, hurt, criticized for something you can’t help or change about yourself. They all do to some extent so its… its easier to share with someone who knows what you pain is like.”

“Still,” Charles says, “this is… personal. I’m not sure I could ever do this.” It was so… so private, like reading a person’s diary but worse.

Erik laughs, “Charles, you already _have_. The first place you took me was your own mind with no hesitation, no holding back. And when I told you I knew the link went both ways you didn’t even flinch. You might know some deeply personal things about me now, Charles, but I felt what you felt in that house. You call it home but you feel more like you belong in this concert listening to music you don’t even like with people who’s political opinions oppose your own. The house is empty, and its cold, because the only thing that gives it any warmth is you.”

Charles can read between the lines. Its easy to be vulnerable when the person you’re being vulnerable to is just as exposed as you are. Charles may have invaded Erik’s privacy deeply but Erik has done the same so now they’re on equal ground. Suddenly he snaps out of the connection, being shoved back into his own mind almost violently and he learns something new. It was also easy to be vulnerable when you can shove a telepath back out of your mind. Charles could get back in easily but Erik knows his moral code, knows that if he’s been removed he’d never re-enter without permission. Erik might have been exposed but it was something he had far more control over than Charles had initially known because he was looking elsewhere. Intelligent, Charles thinks.

The rest of the concert passes quickly because Charles keeps getting lost in Erik’s own feelings because he felt so _strongly_. Now that Charles has been directly in his mind it was easier to pick up on his emotions, his thoughts. Raven and the people around him harass him for details from his thirty seconds in Erik’s mind and god it felt like so much longer, more like _hours_. He says nothing though because they didn’t need to know and Erik would have known he’d do that too. Well, he certainly picked the right telepath to ask questions to.

When they leave Raven is energized, still high off that concert feeling but Charles is falling from his own high. He had felt so much more than Raven though, so it made sense. The last thing he expects is for Erik Lehnsherr to find him and slip him his number and Raven almost passes out.

*

It’s sometime later when he runs into Erik again, chewing on the end of his pen surrounded by notes, books, and articles for his thesis. “You never did text,” Erik says from behind him and Charles damn near jumps out of his skin.

“Dear lord I was not expecting you,” he says, hand pressed to his heart.

Erik laughs, “I can see that. What’re you working on, if you don’t mind me asking?”

“My PhD thesis, I’m examining human evolution in relation to mutation. Specifically how each new species interacted with the last,” he says, keeping the explanation short and sweet. Raven has asked him on more than one occasion to read her his thesis to put her to sleep so he imagines Erik is no more interested.

He was wrong because Erik has a million questions already, and he’s slid into the seat across from Charles. He might have tried to steal an article to read too but Charles beats the man off his research as to not mess up his organization system, which Erik notes isn’t that organized. Erik asks more questions though and Charles was happy to answer, and even more happy that Erik was able to keep up. He was clearly intelligent, sharp witted, and Charles is interested as to what drew Erik to music with a brain like than.

It takes awhile, Erik is a very curious person and if Charles let him he’d never stop asking questions, but he does finally get to ask about Erik’s music. “Music was one of the few things in my life that I’ve ever found solace in. I wanted people to feel the same sort of relief I felt when they heard my music that I did when- when I was young,” he says. Charles gets the glimpse of a woman, and a few notes of a song. His mother, Charles presumes, probably signing him something before bed. Charles is envious because his own mother never took an interest no matter how hard Charles fought to be noticed. “What drew you to science?” Erik asks him, head tilted to the side quizzically.

“Insatiable curiosity and fear. When my mutation developed I was bloody terrified, I knew what happened to people who heard voices in their heads that weren’t their own. How was I to know the difference between crazy and mutant? So I did as much research as I could, trying to figure out what was wrong with me. Eventually I figured out I was a telepath, not a schizophrenic, but I loved the science. I started to look up mutations then and I guess I haven’t really stopped,” he says, gesturing to the mess in front of him.

Erik reaches out and grasps his hand, “I’m sorry, Charles, that sounds awful.”

“It wasn’t so bad,” he says, “there was this awful child, Todd, who liked to pick on me. I made him admit to the whole class that he liked to pick his nose and eat it, and then he did the chicken dance. He had no proof it was me but he knew, and he certainly didn’t pick on me again.” It hadn’t been the right thing to do, he knew now, but he couldn’t help but to feel vindicated then. Erik throws back his head and laughs, sharing his own tales with bullies after his mutation developed. He used to steal their lunch money. Apparently he had amassed some savings too, and bought a guitar with it. Charles shakes his head but he can’t really help but feel that Erik was just a little justified in his actions even if they clearly weren’t right. Bullies were hard, especially as a child.

They continue talking for some time after that, Erik asking more about Charles’ research only to be horrified that Raven used it as a sleeping tool. Charles learned plenty about Erik too, though he can’t help but notice a gaping hole in Erik’s life from the time he was roughly twelve until he was almost nineteen but he doesn’t ask. It was none of his business anyways. Erik is a smooth talker too, and in several languages though Charles only spoke English and some French. He’s rather good company and by the end of it Charles is surprisingly in need of more. It wasn’t often he found someone interested in his work, even Hank was only half interested, and Erik was almost as passionate about the subject as Charles.

*

To his intense surprise he ends up talking to Erik more and more regularly. Raven is irritated with this development because Erik had been _her_ hero, damnit, and now Charles was getting all buddy-buddy with him. Hank was irritated that Raven was irritated and Charles found the whole thing amusing.

Every time he found something new he’d tell Erik and he was always rewarded with a series of questions and they were all so _good_. He loved Erik’s curiosity, even if he could do without Erik’s extremism on certain subjects. But it made for good debates and Erik’s arguments, god, the man could start a revolution with his words and Charles would be right there with him. His passion was so real, so _visceral_ and it was simultaneously energizing and exhausting to be around Erik. It was a strangely attractive fine line and Charles found himself wanting more and thankfully Erik felt the same.

His curiosity about telepathy was also a popular subject, as was Charles’ own curiosity with Erik’s mutation. They could both talk at length about what they could do, how they found out, Charles’ morals, why Erik thought Charles shouldn’t have morals. Their arguments often went in circles but oh, they were so lovely. When Hank and Raven finally see them together in the same room they leave near immediately, both of them citing feeling like they were intruding on something private. Charles finds that strange because they were arguing about politics and he had no idea how _that_ could be so intimate that Hank and Raven felt the need to flee. But they explain that it wasn’t the subject that forced them out; it was the sheer connection that he and Erik had, all the passion and pent up lust had sent them packing before their argument turned to some strange brand of hate-love sex.

Erik finds the while thing very amusing. Of course as soon as someone brings up yet another topic and Charles disagree on they’re back at it, arguing like their lives depended on it and once again Hank and Raven flee.

*

By the time Erik gets around to a real date Raven’s hero worship has taken a back seat to her protectiveness over her brother and poor Erik receives the shovel talk. He doesn’t seem phased though and when he hands her a signed limited addition poster she gets so excited she turns into Charles. That seems to have more of an effect than her shovel talk and Charles laughs at Erik’s eyeballing her suspiciously.

“So how _do_ you tell the difference between Raven and whomever she’s imitating?” Erik asks, looking up at the stars. They were laying on a blanket in a park stargazing and this was the sappiest, most disgustingly romantic thing Charles has ever done and he _loves_ it. And the best part is that after a little sneak peak into Erik’s mind reveals that he came up with the idea himself, and then got mercilessly teased by Emma and Azazel.

“If you’re worried that she’ll try and sneak a kiss by pretending to be me she’s horrible at imitating me. Everyone else, well, just watch closely, but she can’t do an impression of me to save her life. She’s always too dramatic about my mannerisms, and she knows nothing about my thesis, and she agrees with you politically and she has a difficult time reiterating my arguments. But mostly she thinks I’m William Shatner and thus exaggerates every trait I have. It’s actually very amusing, you should watch her try, its funny to watch her fail miserably at being me,” Charles says snickering.

“I was more worried about her being _me_ for a day, but sure, I guess she might try and sneak a kiss in. I guess at least I don’t have to worry about her kissing you, being related and all,” Erik says and Charles snorts because that was _not_ what Erik was thinking. Though he was genuinely worried about his guitar should Raven play Erik For a Day.

“You most certainly do not, and besides, she imitates in body only. I always know it’s Raven because her mind never changes, she finds it annoying because it’s impossible to sneak up on me,” he says. And she has tried many, _many_ times and in many, _many_ different ways. She’s even employed Hank in her mission to Scare Charles. Hank has politely refused but Raven will wear him down one day and Charles will be ready.

“Well I managed,” Erik says, pulling an arm around Charles and dragging him into Erik’s side.

“That was a fluke,” Charles tells him because it was.

“And that time at school?” Erik asks, snickering into his hair.

“Also a fluke,” Charles says stubbornly. He was engrossed in his thesis, damnit, he didn’t expect Erik to come out of _nowhere_ in a quiet library with his studies. Erik wasn’t even supposed to be in town.

“And this morning?” Erik asks.

“I was distracted,” Charles says and Erik laughs.

“Sure, _liebling_ ,” Erik murmurs into Charles’ hair. _Darling_. Charles had Google translated the word when Erik had text it to him. He had a handful of other pet names, all of them equally and surprisingly sweet considering Erik’s generally temperamental nature.

“Well believe it, _liebling_ , because it’s true,” Charles tells him.

Charles can literally _feel_ Erik cringe at that, “please, _please_ never butcher the German language like that again with that _awful_ pronunciation. I may love you, but I do not love you enough to listen to your horrible accent decimating my native tongue,” Erik says and Charles is _offended_.

“I practiced,” Charles says sadly, twisting to face Erik, “I thought I did okay.” The pronunciation was the same; Charles had made _sure_ it was the same.

“Oh, _meine Süße_ , no, it wasn’t even close. I would commend you for trying, but I would commend you more if you never tried again,“ Erik says, brushing their noses together.

“That’s the last time I do anything nice for you,” Charles says, wrinkling his nose. Erik snorts and he doesn’t even look guilty for it either. Charles flips back around to face the stars, “oh, and I love you too, _liebling_.” Erik makes a pained noise and Charles is _determined_ to get that right one day.


End file.
